Unconsidered Trifles
by Neotoma
Summary: In 1595, Carlos Javier loves the theater… a Marvel 1602 story.


Title: Unconsidered Trifles

Chapter: Prologue

Summary: In 1595, Carlos Javier loves the theater…  
Disclaimers: I don't own the characters. Marvel 1602 is the AU lovechild of Neil Gaiman and Andy Kubert.

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In 1585, Carlos Javier left Spain with several trunks, two menservants, and the interest of the Inquisition nipping at his heels.

In 1595, he had a writ of excommunication, a lovely manor house outside of London, a smaller lodging in the City itself, and taste for theater that occasionally brought him into danger that a frail former priest should have avoided.

The hum of minds often bedazzled Javier, so he was foolishly unaware when he came out of the Theatre one day to journey back to his lodgings in the City. On any other day, it would have mattered little, but this day had turned dark with rain and misery.

A man alone and distracted, on such a day, made fine prey for footpads.

Carlos Javier was so startled by the tattered youth that accosted him that he was in the alley and losing his coin before his head cleared enough to understand what was happening. It was the sting of the knife as the youth clumsily sliced away Javier's purse that spurred him into action.

Careful of his will, Javier pushed _sleep_ at the footpad, and the thief fell in a swoon. Buried under by ill-chance, Javier had to shift mightily to recover himself.

Javier looked up. Eyes gleaming like candles peered back at him from the dim between the houses, and Javier reached out to touch the other's mind, seeking only to sooth.

This fellow wasn't at all like Sir John Grey's little daughter; she did very well in her father's country house, and would likely never come to town, not with her gifts pouring other's minds through her own like someone watering wine.

This young Witchbreed was all quicksilver mind and speed, with no gift of hearing others' thoughts to muddle him. Javier wanted him, in measure as a means of guarding the youth from harm which was ever a chance for a Witchbreed, even in lax England, but also as a measure of selfish comfort. The other's mind had been like stroking a lap-lizard's skin – warm and smooth, like fine fresh milk.

The youth roused from his stupor and scrambled backwards on his hands and feet, like a frightened cur. Covered in filth and cowering away into the darkness, the youth was just a shadowed form, with two bright eyes like a cat in torchlight. Javier could not see him well, but the outline was solid – broad and bony as a yearling bear, with monstrously large hands and feet.

"Good evening to you, my good man." Javier said. He ventured to repeat his words mind to mind, for his English while fluent was still accented with the cadences of Navarre and oftentimes country folk found him difficult to follow. "If you need my purse, by Christian charity I should give you my coat as well. Though I do not think it will fit, as I am a weedy fellow indeed."

"Fy vor?" the youth whispered. _Father?_ Javier heard the meaning of it. His footpad had scruples enough to be appalled that he had robbed one he now took for a priest.

"No, I am not a priest, not any longer," Javier said, aloud in English and again in the way of the mind, which bypassed English and Spanish and whatever strange tongue the young Witchbreed thought in, which was most definitely neither of the first two.

_You lie, Carlos,_ the angel of his conscience whispered, _for a priest is a priest forever._

Javier went on, "I am only an exile now." _And a Witchbreed, like you. Come and I—_

"Huldrekind, nae seid!" the youth cried. _I'm a changeling, not a witch!_

Javier drew up short at that. Rarely had he talked to one of his own kind, and never one who had realized he was different from his neighbors and yet not realized he was Witchbreed. There had been those who had been ignorant of what they were – children in the main and sadly, for they were easy fodder for the Inquisition – and grown men who knew what they were in full – Enrique, Mistress Voight, Sean and Thomas his cousin.

"You are mistaken," Javier held out his hand again, leaning heavily on his cane with the other. "Come and I will show you—"

"Nae!" the youth cried, and this time jumped away from Javier. He leapt up, onto a lintel, and from there launching himself up and up until he was crouched like a Barbary ape on the roof. He peered down one last time at Javier, his eyes still bright and golden as lamps, and then scrambled away over the roofs.

Javier kept his attention on his changeling thief, however, and felt him finally alight on a crooked lane deep in the foulest part of Southwark.


End file.
